Day 25 - Oct 10 - Home Again

 We drove from Vandalia to Centertown. Weather wasn't bad but it was windy, which made the camper a little twitchy. The surface of US40, in Illinois, was bad enough that we got back on I70/I44, until we hit US50 in Union, MO.

We had a great time. We so enjoy Michigan's UP. I wonder if we won't end up heading that way again next year, and spending even more days in the UP.

Total miles driven was 2,496. Worst fuel economy was 9.6 mpg, best when pulling trailer was 11.4 mpg. Almost all of the 150 miles on the 11.4 tankful was non-Interstate. The next tankful, 10.7 mpg, was also almost all non-Interstate.

The least we paid for fuel was $2.95 in Palmyra, MO, then $2.97 in Crivitz, WI. The most we paid was $3.76 in Speedway, IN, 2nd most was $3.59 in Vandalia, IL. A surprise was that fuel in MI's UP was less expensive than in the lower peninsula.

God is good, may He bless you and yours.

Days 22, 23 & 24 - October 7-9, I

 Some photos I didn't include earlier:

This is where I had one of the best, if the THE BEST, hamburgers that I have ever eaten. DeTour Village, UP, MI

My brother-in-law Ed took me along when he went to sell their pickup full of walnuts. Below is a photo of walnut hulls being conveyed out to pile. The machine that dehulled them was all enclosed. Also, I didn't want to take photos of any of the Amish folks running the walnut operation.

Day 22 - We travelled from Mom's to Indy. The "campground' we stayed at was an old trailer court next to the Indy speedway. The bleachers you see are seating at the track. As we were setting up we heard an Indycar fire up and head out onto the track, and then it started to rain. The driver didn't manage to make one lap. (Don't know who the driver was, we were told that Jimmy Johnson had been practicing Wednesday, trying to get qualified to run in next years Indy 500.) 

Georgetown Road, the street between the campground and the track ends at the south end of the speedway, about a block from where we were parked. I walked down and took a photo of the main entrance. We thought about visiting the Speedway Museum (I have been there, many years ago, but Kathy never had.) Ended up not going.

We had dinner with our oldest son, Doug, and his husband, at Dawson's in Speedway. It was good, but nothing to write home about.

Day 23 - Most of the time when we were at the "campground" Saturday we could hear two cars running laps at the track. 

We went to the renovated Coca Cola bottling plant. It sat vacant for years but is now an upscale hotel and office complex.

Hotel lobby.

Lobby ceiling looked like brass plates.

Looking along one wall of the building.

Lots of artwork on the walls.

Across the street was the garage. It also was renovated. A large portion of it is now a food court.

A redneck, window shopping.

I'm glad the place has been restored, but it is FAR to upscale for country folks a redneck country bumpkin like me.

In the afternoon we drove to Lebanon, where we used to live, about 25 miles NNW of Indy, to visit one of our neighbors. I sure miss the pole barn I build there and Kathy REALLY misses her kitchen that she had TOTALLY redone while we were there. We don't miss all the traffic.

Day 24 - Doug came by in the morning to bring me some Ekrich Smoky Links, you can't buy them in MO. I love them. (Lil Smokies are definitely not the same thing.) We had also purchased some earlier. Our freezer is now almost totally full of Smokies.

Then it was off to Vandalia, IL, about 180 miles. We drove US40 for maybe 160 miles of the distance. The road was better than the I70 in Indiana but the Illinois stretch was some of the worst US highway we have driven on, not as bad as the miles of Interstate we endured in Iowa and Wisconsin, but rougher than the US highways in MI & IN.

Vandalia is about half way between Indy & Centertown. I thought the campground I found online might be interesting for great-grandkids if we came this way with them some time. NOT! The Kaskaskia Dragon RV park is a patch of rock off the side of a city street. (There is a large steel dragon sculpture out front.) When I made the reservation the lady told me that they only had back-in sites. I told her that was okay as long as they were long enough so that I didn't have to unhook my truck for our overnight stay. Length wasn't a problem.

But the sites were so unlevel front/back (4 degrees) that I had to unhook and drop the front of the trailer to get it reasonably level.

After getting unhooked I connected to the campground electricity & water with no problems. Then I tried to hook up to the sewer connection, the inlet was higher than the discharge on our camper. I walked over to the "office" which is in a hardware store across the street, told them about the problem. I asked if they had a dump station I could use in the morning, since I couldn't dump on the sewer connection at the site. No dump station. The lady made a phone call to someone who didn't sound happy about having to come to the campground, but agreed to do so. About 10 minutes later a guy showed up and told me that if I would not have backed up so far the sewer connection would have worked. ( I didn't argue with him but it was obvious that even if I had parked the camper with the tongue sticking out into the city street it was doubtful that there would have been enough fall to drain the tanks, plus I didn't have 50' of sewer hose with me. I suggested that he cut the pipe and lower the inlet. He gruffly replied that he had planned to do so. He pulled the white coupling (just a light schedule PVC coupling, no threads, no glued joint) off the pipe and cut 3-4" off the pipe. He then pushed the coupling back on the pipe, no glue, no threads for our sewer connection, and left. The worst campground experience we have had in the past 4 years. (It was 88 degrees while we were setting up. The hottest temps we have experienced for weeks.

Live and learn, We know not to stop here in the future, and so will other campers after I post a review on a Internet.

Good night to all.

God is good, may He bless you and yours.

Days 19, 20 & 21 - October 4-6

 Day 19 - We "broke camp" in the rain and headed for Coldwater Lake. Misted rain on and off during the 90 mile trip here. We drove all 2 lane roads. The scenery was great. Roads were good. Stopped at a local orchard and bought some apples. No problems getting set up at Mom's.

Day 20 - Went to Coldwater with  Mom. Mom & Kathy did some grocery shopping at the Meijer store while I took a propane tank to Tractor Supply to have it refilled. Anyone know where you  can get 30# tanks recertified. I need to do that for the ones on our camper, or buy new ones. Tractor Supply wanted $85 for one.

Back to Mom's and then down to Ed & Cindy's (one of Kathy's sisters) in the afternoon, in Montpelier, OH. Ed & Cindy pick up walnuts every year. Ed's old half ton pickup was full enough that any more walnuts would have fallen off. I rode along with  Ed as he took them to the Amish place that buys them. They "dehull" them, bag them and ship them to Stockton, MO, once they have accumulated a semi-load. Watching the dehulling was interesting. Ed got a check for $140 for the truck load, about 800# after dehulling. There are ton's of walnuts around that people could pick up for free to make a few bucks, but why bother when the feds will give you free money. The place in Stockton would like to process 25 million pounds a year but at current prices they can only buy 10-12 million pounds, because so few want to pick them up.

We then met Kathy, Cindy & Nancy (another of Kathy's sisters) at the Dairy Treat in Edon, OH for dinner.

Day 21 - Spent hours trying to get Mom's cable/internet/phone bill reduced. No success. Cindy came up, picked up Kathy and they went to a specialty grocery  in Bronson, MI.

God is good, may He bless you and yours.

Day 19 - Sunday, October 3 - DeTour Village to Ionia, MI

 Not much but driving today. 289 miles from DeTour Village to Lakeside Campground near Ionia, MI, 85 more miles tomorrow to get to my Mom's near Coldwater Lake Michigan.

No rain when we packed up but it was foggy. Kathy said she could barely see the water when we crossed the Mackinaw Bridge. There was a light mist falling most of the day, with occasional showers. 

We stopped at a "fruit stand" about 20 miles from here and bought some apples and tomatoes. It wasn't raining when we went in, but it sure was when we came out. Managed to get utilities hooked up without getting rained on.

Most of today's traveling was on 2 lane MI highways, so much better than the Interstates and limited access highways.

Supper is on the table, better get this sent.

God is good, may He bless you and yours.

Day 18 - Saturday, October 2 - DeTour, MI

 Not much to report today. We sat out on the porch swing this morning and watched the bay. It was cloudy but temps were nice.

Around noon we drove into DeTour Village. Seems like a nice little town. We had lunch there. I had one of the best mushroom cheeseburgers I've ever had, Kathy said her shrimp was good, but not as good as my burger. We walked a little and drove a loop through the town. We had considered taking the ferry to Drummond Island but there didn't seem to be enough out there to make it worth the effort. After topping off with fuel ($3.35/gal, the most we have paid during the trip but not bad for very rural Michigan) we headed back to the campground.

Did some more sitting watching the bay and some walking before the rain started. It rained fairly hard a couple of times this afternoon. Hopefully it won't be raining when we hook up to head south in the morning.

We have driven 1,381 miles.. Google maps says we are 855 miles from Centertown, if we took the shortest route from here. I'm guessing we will drive close to another 1,000 miles before we make it back.

God is good, may He bless you and yours.

Day 18 - Friday, October 1 - Sault Ste Marie to De Tour Village, MI

 Another beautiful day here. I honestly don't know how God could have made it any nicer. We lazed around at Soo Locks Campground this morning. We finally left around noon. It is only 57 miles to Paradise Point Campground in De Tour Village and early check-in time was 1 PM. With the exception of a couple of miles of city streets inside Sault Ste Marie the roads we traveled, both state and county roads, were in great shape. The route my crazy Garmin RV GPS tried to get us to follow would have added over 10 miles to the trip, to keep us a state highway longer. We ignored it and followed the paper map in our Atlas, which was the route shown using Google maps. The Garmin GPS kept trying to reroute us. Twice it wanted us to drive down a gravel road. Someone at Garmin needs to do a LOT of work on their algorithms. 

Welcome to Paradise Point (the gate was just starting to open to let someone out of the campground).

Ma & Pa Dirschell all set up and having a late lunch.

Two 5th wheel units pulled in minutes after we backed into our space. The guy next to us mentioned that this area must be Duramax row. All 3 trucks in the photo are Duramax's. Mine is a 2005, its the newest of the 3. The guy next to us has a 2003 that he bought new and his son-in-law has a 2004. They are from the Grand Rapids, MI area. I didn't think to ask how many miles they had on their trucks. The guy with the 2003 said that he leaves his in the garage most of the winter, to keep it out of the road salt. He said he drives "Old Rusty", another truck he has, during the winter months.

We didn't make it in time for any morning sun but Kathy was:

Sittin' in the morning sun, She'll be sittin' when the evening comes watching the ships roll in, then watch'em roll away again, yeah, she was sittin' on the dock of the bay watching the tide roll away..." No tides here and now ships in this bay. For those of you to young to remember the song:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rTVjnBo96Ug 

The land way out is Canada. We have seen a couple of freighters on their way from Lake Superior to Lake Huron.

There are only 14 sites here, but they are nice. Sites are on the right. On the left is a channel with docks for boats.

I got a shock as we were driving down here today. I saw a blue yard sign and thought I was going to see the first Biden sign in the over 1,400 miles we have driven. I was wrong, it was a Blue Lives Matter sign. We did see more Trump and Trump/Pence signs again today, in addition to American flags flown by folks who still thing the is a great nation.

God is good, may He bless you and yours.